I have met so many lovely people in this town I almost never want to leave. The centre of town is called old town but they seem to have trashed everything that was old and rebuilt it in the old style. Every building is identical. Every one is a shop selling either jewellery, scarves, clothes, pictures or food for the hoards of tourists. Whilst it looks artificial it is still nice, the streets are cobbled and a complete maze. I've got lost so often now that I've stopped worrying. I'm sure I've approached the same shop owners several times to ask for directions back to my hostel.
Took a bike and cycled around the local area, even 'trekked' on some Tibetan horses. I say 'trekked' as we followed a road down to the local town - Baisha and then came back.
The highlight of this visit was Leaping Tiger Gorge, yours truly trekked for TWO whole days in this glorious gorge. The scenery was amazing. The first day we trekked for four hours solidly uphill. The tranquility in the first three hours was absolutely destroyed as we were followed by a man and his horse, the horse had bells attached to his harness. Every so often the bloke would have his horse nudge us in an attempt to make us walk faster and tire us out on the uphill so that we would use his horse instead.
Stayed in a lovely guest house and feasted with other trekkers. The second day it rained, the clouds were low and they obscured the mountain tops, on the plus side the trek was mainly downhill. I should say that we completed this entire trek on foot, probably my greatest sporting achievement to date. I was completely buzzing whilst I was doing it and the day after too. More so as we heard from the locals they are planning to dam this gorge and water levels are expected to rise by 300m.
When I come back to the UK I'm determined to force myself to like camping as I think I am missing out.
Currently freezing my butt in Zhongdian and have everything crossed in the hope that tomorrow I can get my permit and ticket to Tibet.
